A Little Oxford Dictionary of Humorous Quotations

circular sent out to forestall unwanted visitors:

Mr J. Ruskin is about to begin a work of great importance and therefore begs that in reference to calls and correspondence you will consider him dead for the next two months.

John Ruskin 1819–1900 English art and social critic

Wilde had written to the Daily Telegraph, but explained in a covering letter:

I don’t wish to sign my name, though I am afraid everybody will know who the writer is: one’s style is one’s signature always.

Oscar Wilde 1854–1900 Irish dramatist and poet

Libraries

see alsoBOOKS

RUTH: They’ll sack you.

NORMAN: They daren’t. I reorganized the Main Index.

When I die, the secret dies with me.

Alan Ayckbourn 1939– English dramatist

There is nowhere in the world where sleep is so deep as in the libraries of the House of Commons.

Chips Channon 1897–1958 American-born British Conservative politician

Th’ first thing to have in a libry is a shelf. Fr’m time to time this can be decorated with lithrachure. But th’ shelf is th’ main thing.

Finley Peter Dunne 1867–1936 American humorous writer

I’ve been drunk for about a week now, and I thought it might sober me up to sit in a library.

F. Scott Fitzgerald 1896–1940 American novelist

Mr Cobb took me into his library and showed me his books, of which he had a complete set.

Ring Lardner 1885–1933 American writer

Lies

see alsoTRUTH

She [Lady Desborough] tells enough white lies to ice a wedding cake.

Margot Asquith 1864–1945 British political hostess

of propaganda:

That branch of the art of lying which consists in very nearly deceiving your friends without quite deceiving your enemies.

Francis M. Cornford 1874–1943 English academic

Telling lies is a bit like tiling bathrooms—if you don’t know how to do it properly, it’s best not to try.

Tom Holt 1961– English novelist

on being told that Lord Astor claimed that her allegations concerning himself were untrue:

He would, wouldn’t he?

Mandy Rice-Davies 1944–2014 English model and showgirl

A little inaccuracy sometimes saves tons of explanation.

Saki 1870–1916 Scottish writer

In exceptional circumstances it is necessary to say something that is untrue in the House of Commons.

William Waldegrave 1946– British Conservative politician

Untruthful! My nephew Algernon? Impossible! He is an Oxonian.

Oscar Wilde 1854–1900 Irish dramatist and poet

Life and its Challenges

see alsoLIFESTYLE

If you can’t be a good example, then you’ll just have to be a horrible warning.

Catherine Aird 1930– English writer

WOODY ALLEN: I feel that life is—is divided up into the horrible and the miserable.

Woody Allen 1935– American film director, writer, and actor, in the film Annie Hall, written with Marshall Brickman (1941–)

WOODY ALLEN: Life doesn’t imitate art. It imitates bad television.

Woody Allen 1935– American film director, writer, and actor, in the film Husbands and Wives

I have yet to see any problem, however complicated, which, when you looked at it in the right way, did not become still more complicated.

Poul Anderson 1926–2001 American science fiction writer

Nothing matters very much and very few things matter at all.

Arthur James Balfour 1848–1930 British Conservative statesman

Life, you know, is rather like opening a tin of sardines. We are all of us looking for the key.

Alan Bennett 1934– English dramatist and actor

W. C. FIELDS: It’s a funny old world—a man’s lucky if he gets out of it alive.

Walter de Leon and Paul M. Jones screenwriters, in the film You’re Telling Me

I find I always have to write something on a steamed mirror.

Elaine Dundy 1921–2008 American writer

Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving.

Albert Einstein 1879–1955 German-born theoretical physicist

All men are equal—all men, that is to say, who possess umbrellas.

E. M. Forster 1879–1970 English novelist

Drama is life with the dull bits cut out.

Alfred Hitchcock 1899–1980 British-born film director

Life is just one damned thing after another.

Elbert Hubbard 1859–1915 American writer

Most of one’s life ... is one prolonged effort to prevent oneself thinking.

Aldous Huxley 1894–1963 English novelist

Do you know how helpless you feel if you have a full cup of coffee in your hand and you start to sneeze?

Jean Kerr 1923–2003 American writer